Which of the following would you consider to be the best way to address the church's financial problems?

Numbers are percentages

Gender

Attend Mass1

Age

Income2

Law
resignation3

Faithimportance4

Total

Male

Female

W

M

Y

<Y

18-39

40-64

65+

<40k

40-80k

>80k

Agree

Disagree

Very

Some

Not

Sell chancery property

62.9

60.7

64.9

59.9

60.0

65.9

70.8

57.9

65.5

65.0

51.3

62.9

77.6

65.7

40.9

62.0

59.1

72.8

Close some parishes

6.5

8.2

5.0

6.6

8.0

5.9

5.7

12.5

4.9

10.3

8.4

3.0

6.8

5.4

4.4

9.1

5.8

Close some parochial schools

2.4

3.0

1.9

2.0

4.8

3.2

3.0

1.9

2.8

1.6

4.5

2.5

2.3

2.2

2.6

2.7

Lay off some church workers

4.7

4.5

4.9

3.9

4.3

7.0

1.6

5.4

3.8

6.0

5.1

4.8

4.3

4.5

8.2

3.3

6.5

4.2

Go to the Vatican and get help.

1.4

1.2

1.5

0.8

2.5

0.9

1.9

2.2

1.6

1.8

0.8

1.1

1.6

0.7

2.0

1.4

Or is it something else

8.0

8.8

7.4

12.9

8.9

4.0

1.5

7.9

7.3

10.5

12.9

2.2

5.9

7.2

18.2

9.7

9.4

1.6

Don't know

13.0

12.1

13.9

13.9

14.1

10.4

15.2

13.3

12.4

14.0

17.0

14.8

7.1

11.4

19.7

16.6

10.7

10.0

Refused

1.0

1.6

0.5

2.2

1.1

2.1

1.6

1.0

0.3

5.4

1.2

0.6

1.5

Notes

1 Survey participants were asked "How often do you attend Mass?" The answers were: Weekly (W); monthly (M); yearly (Y); and less than once a year (<Y).

2 Survey participants were asked "Into which of the following categories does your annual household income belong?" The answers were: Less than $40,000 (<40k); between $40,000 and $80,000 (40-80k); and more than $80,000 (>80k).

3 Survey participants were asked "Did you agree or disagree with Cardinal Law's decision to resign?"

4 Survey participants were asked "How important would you say the Catholic faith is to your everyday life?" The answers were: Very important (Very); somewhat important (Some); and not very important (Not).

Margin of error: +/– 5 percentage points on
questions answered by all Catholics. When pollsters offered choices to the respondents, the choices were rotated so that different options were offered first to different respondents.

This poll of 400 Catholics living in the Archdiocese of Boston was conducted May 4-6, 2003, by KRC/Communications Research.